The pseudodemocratic Spanish Constitution doesn’t go as far as to state this openly, but most everybody knows that Spanish nationalists play by a different set of rules. While corruption splatters the Iberian Peninsula, those who wind up being punished for it are generally of the peripheral nationalist variety. Case in point: CiU, the ruling coalition in Catalonia, had a lien put on its headquarters because members of the party are suspected of having collaborated with Félix Millet, who is accused of pillaging some 40M€ from several government agencies. In all, 30 members of CiU have been accused of counts related to corruption. Not a small amount, but it pales in comparison to the combined 464 members of PP and PSOE, the main Spanish nationalist parties, who have suffered the same fate. Of course, there are no liens against their property.
Spanish media have admitted that Spanish police use extralegal means to attack Catalan politicians, going as far as to try and sabotage the recent Catalan elections. A few days before voting took place, El Mundo (a right-wing newspaper that claims, against all evidence, that the March 2004 bombings in Madrid were the work of ETA and not al-Qaeda, and the second most read newspaper in Spain) published that the incumbent President Mas owns ilegal Swiss bank accounts. Its source: a cut-and-paste draft of a police investigation that no police agency will claim ownership of. A piece of paper that would get any Journalism School student flunked was validated by Spanish nationalists in a desperate attempt to swing the Catalan elections, faling miserably: 87 of 135 MP’s are in favor of self-determination, with only 28 against it
The discrimination that Catalans suffer was made even more visible three days after the Catalan polls on November 25th 2012. Manuel Bustos, mayor of Sabadell and longtime boss of the Catalan branch of PSOE (Spanish Socialists), was set to be indicted on three counts of corruption in late October. This, of course, would have damaged his unionist party’s chances at the polling station. Evidently, the State Attorney saw fit to hold the indictments until the elections had passed.
As Catalonia enters the final stage of its democratic self-determination process, a six-month negotiation with Spain to set the rules for the referendum, Spanish police and media are working overtime to attack the worthiness of Catalan politics, politicians and institutions. Intellectual honesty is not necessary: a recent document mistook euros for pesetas, nevermind that one of the former is worth over 166 of the latter.
You will undoubtedly be bombarded with Spanish reports of Catalan corruption in the upcoming year. All we ask is that you make an unbiased judgment instead of taking Spain’s word for it.
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